Buy it... if you want to hear Hans Zimmer's lovable, though intentionally dysfunctional combination of Nino Rota's European sensibilities and zany 1950's lounge rhythms.

Avoid it... if accordions, whistlers, high 50's jazz, a little Zimmer techno, and snappy rhythms could potentially cause you to obsess over household cleaning projects.

Zimmer

Matchstick Men: (Hans Zimmer) Not your typical Ridley Scott film, Matchstick Men combines the elements of intimate character drama and professional con games, creating a quirky and often funny film that was received well by critics. When properly medicated, Nicolas Cage's primary character, Roy Waller, is an outstanding con man despite his eccentricities of personality, but when a 14-year-old daughter he didn't know he had is thrust upon his life, he has to reevaluate his profession, both with and without medication. The dark comedy teamed Scott once again with composer Hans Zimmer, a long pairing that had solidified itself with Gladiator a few years earlier. Scott had his own clear ideas of what he wanted to hear in the score for his off-kilter, doomed-heist story. He called upon Zimmer early in pre-production, and, with the assistance of a few music supervisors as well, outlined a collection of songs and impressed a similar style upon Zimmer for the construction of the score. The project would have the sensibilities of a European film, adapting morbid comedy elements and sprinkling them with funny derangements and even a touch of family drama. As Scott stated from the very beginning, "If the score doesn't have an accordion in it, we don't have a movie." You get the impression that had it been possible, Scott would have cut and pasted Nino Rota music throughout Matchstick Men rather than worry about making an adaptation of that sound. It was expressly understood from the start that a return to the flashy, but sophisticated Rota sounds of the composer's prime (for similarly themed films) would be Zimmer's focus, and in a display of the man's true talents, Zimmer raises Rota from the dead and offers music for Matchstick Men that would make the classic composer smile. In fact, the theme for La Dolce Vita is utilized (with full credit from Zimmer) as the title theme for this film. In many parts, the theme is adapted in its original spirit, although Zimmer does offer some of his own snazzy attitude to the mix. That mix typically takes Rota's romance and infuses it with even seedier sounds of the 1950's and 60's, perfectly setting the table for Scott's stylistically eccentric film.

The effective result of Matchstick Men yields one of Zimmer's most memorable works. The flair for comedy writing that he possesses is on full display here, with the zany personality of the music shining through in several creative solo performances. Of course, the accordion is an essential piece of European culture, and Zimmer works it into nearly every tango-rhythmed cue of the score. For those of you who wish death upon accordion players, take heart in Zimmer's knack for featuring the instrument without allowing it to run away with the spotlight. It serves in an accompanying role much like the whistlers do. The whistling is the essential piece of the innocent 1950's equation, offering an excellent point of depth to the main character's obsession with cleaning his environment. A '50's band, complete with all of the woodwinds that you heard in pop jazz of the time, are floated with marimbas, a vibraphone, and keyboarding that places the score squarely in a loungey atmosphere. The swing of the score reaches its height in "Carpeteria," with the assistance of a whimsical string section. Despite the temptation to connect this sound with John Williams' more stylistically reserved jazz in Catch Me If You Can from the previous year, Zimmer's work for Matchstick Men is more wacky (you can't help but shake your head at the chirping bird sounds at the start of "Weird is Good") while being lovable in a slightly dysfunctional sort of way and considerate of the genre from which it was derived. The Rota-related material is inspired directly from some of the songs utilized in the film, with the falsely innocent "Swedish Rhapsody" perfectly establishing the double-faced mood for Zimmer's underscore. The inclination to stay close to Rota's works causes a very obvious, though welcomed waltz inspired by The Godfather in the final track of the album, "The Banker's Waltz." Likewise, a hint of European dramatic tragedy can be heard in "Shame on You," which is the first and only cue that expands upon the family drama; it once again puts Zimmer in the position of utilizing his favorite, classical chord progressions with the strings. The tone of "Pygmies!" reminds of Danny Elfman's brooding melodrama. For the most part, the synthesized elements typical to Zimmer's studio are placed at a lower priority to the dynamic tones of live instruments for the project.

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The downside of Matchstick Men is that its personality does have the capability to get on your nerves. Unless you specifically seek the score for its unique atmosphere, its happy-go-lucky spirit and similarly themed songs could test your patience. There is only so much of that zippy, light-hearted comedy writing from the 50's that a person can tolerate before fearing that you'll get one of those false 50's-era smiles plastered permanently on your face (Americans will recognize this hideous condition from one company's "male enhancement" television advertisements in the U.S. during the 2000's). Even in its authenticity, the lounge band elements are slightly off-kilter during all of their performances, perhaps an intentional move to keep the audience on edge during scenes of criminal activity. Like the characters in the film, the score is thus intentionally flawed in its hiccupping rhythms and sometimes incongruent bass string plucking. Only one Zimmer score cue is remarkably out of place; the techno-laced "Tuna Fish and Cigarettes" (a coming of age burst of reality) is an abrasive shot into the musical future and does not fit with the surrounding Rota-like music. The songs from the film fit reasonably well with Zimmer's work (a memorable Wayne Newton song heard in the film is omitted from the album, however), though their placement throughout the product could dampen Zimmer enthusiasts' enjoyment of the score's merits alone. The opening song by Bobby Darin probably best captures the attitude and subject matter for the film and score. On the other hand, the "Swedish Rhapsody," although establishing an almost carnival atmosphere (mentioned previously as a good influence for Zimmer's fluffy work), explodes out of the surrounding score material in a way that could give a person nightmares of runaway Scandinavian merry-go-rounds. The album's notes and credits are presented with the same zany spirit heard in the music, with Zimmer seemingly getting more freely humorous with every score he produced at the time. Overall, you have to admire Zimmer's talent and ability to meld two genres as per Scott's eccentric wishes (resulting in almost a four-star rating and devoid of the mass of co-writers typical to the composer's work at the time), but Matchstick Men is arguably a score better appreciated than enjoyed. You might get the feeling that if you hear it too often, you might start exhibiting behavior like that of Roy Waller in the film. ***   Amazon.com Price Hunt: CD or Download

Bias Check:

For Hans Zimmer reviews at Filmtracks, the average editorial rating is 3.09 (in 80 reviews) and the average viewer rating is 3.08 (in 253,581 votes). The maximum rating is 5 stars.